


after

by embraidery



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Gen, Grieving, Post-Battle of Hogwarts, Tiny Little Drabble, mentioned Fred/Angelina, so Fred is dead
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-11
Updated: 2018-03-11
Packaged: 2019-03-29 22:19:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 276
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13936581
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/embraidery/pseuds/embraidery
Summary: snippets of George’s life without Fred





	after

i. For a while George is twice as loud, cracks twice as many jokes, sets off twice as many fireworks. Everyone is relieved, then worried, when he goes silent.

ii. For a while George uses Fred’s wand. He thought it would feel the same as his own; it doesn’t. He learns more about the ways in which Fred was different than he did when Fred was alive. 

iii. Everyone expects George to name his first son after Fred. He can’t. Fred was his own man. George can’t tangle his brother’s personhood with his child’s.

iv. George never gets a prosthetic ear. Sometimes he thinks about it, but he can imagine the look on his mother’s face when she sees her dead son, so he doesn’t. 

v. Years later, at his wedding, George has no best man. All his best friends split the best man’s responsibilities between them. 

vi. Sometimes George has dreams so realistic he wakes up forgetting. He starts to tell Angelina what he and Fred got up to before the dream dissolves. 

vii. George orders Fred’s favourite foods at the pub when he’s feeling lonely, even though he never liked tripe. He leaves half for Fred.

viii. On the bad days, George can’t look at himself in the mirror. Angelina charms the mirrors to ignore him. 

ix. Harry tells George that spirits can become ghosts or move on. George can’t decide which would be more heartbreaking; Fred staying as a ghost or moving on.

x. When George eventually dies, he finds that he’s finally ready to make a decision entirely his own, and he drifts beyond this world, hoping to find a better one.


End file.
